Uniqueness vs Creativity: A Critique of Modern Literature

In the realm of modern literature, a multitude of texts have produced a “thicket of information”(Goldsmith, “Uncreative writing” 1). In this “thicket”, all works seemingly blend together into one jumbled-up, problematic mess. To cut through this jungle of mundaneness, writers aspire to fabricate what they perceive as “creative” literature. There are even guides to doing this; though most are filled with cliché terms and phrases such as: explorer, ground-breaker, and going where no one has gone before(8). But are they all missing the point? Kenneth Goldsmith, author of uncreative writing and professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, thinks so. He argues that the current literary world is plagued by the need to be unique. This need

The random paint splatters on the canvas are meant to evoke visualizations of their creation and their creator. The creator, or writer in Goldsmith’s case, makes “all of the [plans] and decisions beforehand and the execution is a perfunctory [or mindless] affair. The idea becomes a machine that makes art”(lewitt, “uncreative writing” 4). The choosing of the colors, the canvas, the brushes…etc. and the order of the colors, the amount of color, and the instruments used, is the part of the art that holds the most significance. The machine, or the creator, and the process are what are on display rather than the resulting

He argues that the way to do this is by writing “uncreatively” or by giving more importance to the context, construction, and character of a work rather than the content. He proves that this can be done by mentioning the class that he teaches, where students plagiarize purposefully. The students construct a new work based on another work, they alter the context yet the content remains the same. For example students are given a dictation and are told to write it down. Although everyone writes the same words, the way they are written is different; various people placed emphasis on certain words while others did